Enfilade

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It’s not an eighteenth-century exhibition per se, though the starting point is Joseph Siffred Duplessis’s Portrait of Madame de Saint-Maurice (mention of which also opens Ruth La Ferla’s review of the exhibition for The New York Times) . . . From the exhibition website:

Beyond Measure: Fashion and the Plus-Size* Woman
80WSE, New York University, 13 January — 3 February 2016

Curated by Tracy Jenkins with Dévika Kanadé, Julie Smolinski, Lauren
Wilson, Meg Pierson, Mem Barnett, Shelly Tarter, and Ya’ara Keydar

The Masters of Arts Candidates in New York University’s Visual Culture: Costume Studies Program proudly present their annual exhibition entitled Beyond Measure: Fashion and the Plus-Size* Woman , on view at 80WSE, New York University Steinhardt School’s gallery space, from January 13th to February 3rd, 2016. The exhibition explores the shifting discourse surrounding the plus-size woman in relation to fashion and the body. Through a series of objects, the exhibit will examine the plus-size woman’s place within fashion and its defining entity—the fashion industry—from the perspectives of designers, manufacturers, the general public, and the individual women themselves.

Joseph Siffred Duplessis, Portrait of Madame de Saint-Maurice, 1776 (exhibited in Paris at the Salon of 1776), oil on canvas (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

As a complicated cultural construct itself, the very term ‘plus-size’ evokes a myriad of reactions, thus, “after careful consideration from the curators of the exhibit, the term ‘plus-size’ is used here for its association with fashion, the primary focus of this exhibition,” said curatorial director of the exhibit, Tracy Jenkins. The fashion industry has played an undeniable role in enabling the stigmatization of larger women’s bodies. Despite consumer needs, plus-size fashion has traditionally been given little sartorial energy. Yet women of all physiques have had to clothe themselves, and thus have stood somewhere in relation to the fashion system. The plus-size woman’s place within the history of the body and her space within the fashion industry is presented here through a diverse set of objects emphasizing her relationship to gender and body politics as well as cultural attitudes toward beauty and health.

These objects, among others, will include an early twentieth-century photograph of A Ticket to Nettie the Fat Girl, representing one of the earliest views of greater weight being equated with greater immorality, and the fetishization of the supposedly deviant body. In a series of advertisements from the mid-twentieth century, women considered undesirably skinny were encouraged to consume dietary supplements to add ‘sex-appealing curves’. Their younger counterparts from the same era who weighed ‘more than average’ were deemed ‘Chubbies’ by pattern companies, presented through the Simplicity Chubbie Pattern in this exhibit. It is not until the 1990s that the plus-size woman in fashion takes center stage when model and muse Stella Ellis took the fashion world into bold new territory as she strode the high fashion runways alongside ‘straight size’ models. Presented in the exhibit is a 1992 photograph of Ellis in bespoke Jean Paul Gaultier, representing her collaboration with the designer, and her photographer, who championed Ellis’s look. Attention will also be paid to the plus-size woman’s relationship with fashion in recent years. These objects will include images of plus-sized models using padding during photo shoots, which has drawn comparisons to the use of Photoshop to create unattainable ideals of beauty. Throughout this presentation of objects and media, ranging from historical to contemporary, this exhibition aims to present the plus-size woman taking her place as a woman of and in fashion.

Thursday, 28 January 2016, 5–9pm
To celebrate the opening of Beyond Measure: Fashion and the Plus-Size* Woman, the NYU M.A. Costume Studies Candidates will host a reception and panel discussion. The opening will be held at the gallery space at 80WSE where attendees are encouraged to explore the exhibit as well as meet with the curators. Starting at 7:00, a panel discussion will be held at NYU (location TBD). The event will include a keynote speech by Professor Leah Sweet, Parsons the New School for Design, and followed by a discussion with plus-size model and muse Stella Ellis, Eden Miller, the first plus-size designer to show at New York Fashion Week and Buzzfeed writer Kaye Toal. Please confirm attendance RSVP@beyondmeasurenyu.com.

In conjunction with Beyond Measure: Fashion and the Plus-Size* Woman, a mobile web app will be available to explore the exhibition beyond the walls of 80WSE. This will include supplemental multimedia material including videos, images, and discussions with the curators.

Beyond Measure: Fashion and the Plus-Size* Woman is organized by curatorial director Tracy Jenkins, a faculty member in NYU’s M.A. Costume Studies Program and by the co-curators: Dévika Kanadé, Julie Smolinski, Lauren Wilson, Meg Pierson, Mem Barnett, Shelly Tarter, and Ya’ara Keydar, Masters of Arts Candidates in New York University’s Visual Culture: Costume Studies Program.